Science Fair Project Encyclopedia
Flat
Alternate uses: Flat (disambiguation)
In music, flat means "lower in pitch." More specifically, in music notation, flat means "lower in pitch by a semitone," and has an associated symbol (
), which looks like a lowercase "b"; the note A flat is shown in musical notation in Figure 1. Under equal temperament, C flat is the same as, or enharmonically equivalent to, B and F flat is the same as E.
There also exist double-flats, which look like 
and lower a note by two semitones. Less often one will encounter half, three-quarter, or otherwise altered flats.
In musical tuning, flat can also mean "very slightly lower in pitch." If two strings are slightly out of tune, the lower-pitched one is said to be flat with respect to the other.
See also: sharp.
The Unicode character '♭' (266D hex) may display as a flat sign on some computers.
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